Toddlers on a plane

[gingertigercat]

I want to see how others would react in my situation or if my lack of sleep led to me being unreasonable.

On a rather long and early flight, hence the lack of sleep, I had a toddler behind me. The father was asleep in a separate row. The mother was asleep sprawled over 2 seats and the grandmother was looking after the toddler who was mainly on her lap. The whole flight he kicked our chairs, smacked the seats, grabbed at us, stuck his head through the gaps, and clambered between his grans lap and over his mum. He was loud throughout the flight. The gran did tell him a few times to stop smacking the seats but it did nothing.

I think had the mum just been asleep in her own seat there would have been much less disruption. I would have said something but I felt bad seeing as the gran wasn't the parent and I'm not very confrontational.

I understand toddlers can be hard work and the parents were probably exhausted but surely it shouldn't have been at other passengers expense? What would other people do in this situation?

deliverdaniel i think annie is responding to the same comment i was

farandole thank you. sorry to hear about your dad. that sounds really tough. And yes- we've been in similar situations flying with toddlers. But even if we hadn't been and we'd been flying to Mauritius for a holiday- the idea that families with kids should not fly at all is just awful. Do we really want a society like that?

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The new blockbuster thriller-horror, starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Tom Hardy!

Thirty Bloodthirsty toddlers escape from a secure holding warehouse and are accidentally packed onto a passenger flight...in the air, only Calpol can save you!

Jonesy.

I'm seeing two extremes here - the "my kid should get to do whatever they want and devil take the hindmost" crowd, and the "children should be seen and not heard, and preferably not seen either" crowd. Neither of them is right or being particularly nice.

The answer, of course, and the stance most reasonable people on this thread and in this world are taking is that of course you expect a little bit of noise from a toddler, and certain levels of noise are inevitable in the world. Toddlers will be toddlers, sure. But equally, parents must be parents.

Involve the cabin crew if you do not feel able to speak yourself. You could have done so on the basis the child seemed upset, and ask if they had anything such as a toy to keep the young child amused.

I think all the people talking about not letting kids fly until they are old enough to behave themselves, have only ever travelled long haul for holiday/fun and lack awareness of the fact that entire families move for work/business as well.

Also, the most annoying people I have met on planes were not toddlers, they were:

-Drunk stag parties
-manspreading "important" businessmen who take both arm rests and have to press their legs into yours to make space for their bits, unfold laptop and open their paper as wide as possible

• the sick feverish guy who had shakes and could not stop vomiting

guess these were all.male....I'd rather sit next to a toddler than an entitled selfish male

And I DO think other people's babies are cute, btw, they are

Yanbu I flew long haul with my girls from about 4 months of age and they were taught to sit in their seat nicely, I kept them entertained and made sure that they didn't kick the seat. A bit of discipline is all that is needed in most situations. Chair kicking is the most annoying thing ever forcthe passenger in front and I will always turn round and ask a parent nicely to stop their child kicking my chair. You pay enough money for flights you deserve some comfort and not to be hassled by other people's children. I have been complimented on a number of occasions about my children's behaviour on a plane. Take plenty for them to do, plenty of food and explain to them the situation.

it's totally disingenous to infer that from what I said

Except you said this, daniel

As pp have suggested, if someone really is so ill that losing a night's sleep could make them very sick, they really shouldn't be flying either

"My needs and wants are so important that I NEED to fly, regardless of whether I am enjoying it, my toddler is enjoying it, or the other passengers around me are enjoying it. But if you have any heath conditions at all - even ones which aren't dangerous, just debilitating and painful, too bad, you should stay at home, regardless of what you need or want to do which might necessitate you going on a plane!" That's abelism, and if you cannot see that, daniel you need to go away and educate yourself.

Jonesy

Do we really want a society like that?

You seem totally fine advocating for a society in which people who are not in perfect health are told they shouldn't fly, daniel.

And nobody is saying small children should never fly - that's a total strawman. I am saying that if anyone has a temporary condition (having a particularly fractious toddler who cannot settle on flights) that means flying is miserable for them, miserable for their kids, and miserable for everyone else, then maybe they should consider deferring flying until that temporary condition is over, and their toddler is no longer a toddler.

No one should be telling anyone else not to fly.
Everyone on the plane should be doing their best not to annoy other people.
Just because some children can be quiet from an early age doesn't mean they all can and if we start banning people who can't be quiet we are veering into dodgy ground.

Of course no one has said that any group shouldn't fly, just that everyone has to balance their needs and difficulties with the needs and difficulties of everyone else. All we can do is encourage respect for others and do our very best not to inconvenience anyone else. But no one person or group's right to travel is inherently greater than any other's. A peaceful flight is not a right, it's a small miracle.

It's absolutely ludicrous to call it 'ableism', unless we invent a new term 'family-ism' or 'infantilism' to suggest that families with young children who may or may not be able to keep quiet for 12 hours shouldn't fly. I mean, by the same token people would never be able to take their children on long train journeys or stay in hotel rooms because people next door might be able to hear them if they woke up in the night. And presumably people who suffer from debilitating migraines if they lose sleep find long haul travel extremely difficult because of the time difference, jet lag, strange beds and all the myriad reasons that any of us may sleep badly while travelling. So travel is going to be inherently risky for them. Of course it's up to them whether they take that risk or not. But they can't possibly expect to control all aspects of their environment on any trip.

But they can't possibly expect to control all aspects of their environment on any trip.

Where has anyone expected this, Ontopofthesunset? I'd be fascinated to know.

I think it boils down to the fact that there has to be give and take on both sides. A parent should do what they can to keep their child from disturbing others unduly. But generally people should understand that the parents are limited in what they can do because of the limited space available.

And children are all very different in terms of personality type. Two of my dd couldn't be more different. My 13 year old I have barely ever had to tell off in her entire life. She sat still on planes from a baby, I took her to see a ballet when she was 3 and she sat through the whole thing and never made a sound. She never fussed when she had a cold. Dd3 is the opposite, although she does have ADHD. I do remember her trying to kick seats on planes when she was little. I told her off of course and made it clear she was absolutely not to do it. But she still tried!

All I'm saying is don't be smug about how well behaved your child is - you could easily have another who is more challenging and it's mainly luck and not that you are a superior parent.

I didn't say that anyone on this thread had said that they expected to control all aspects of a trip - I simply said that no one could expect to. Which I believe to be true. I was making an asseveration that I believe. I was pointing out that travel is inherently 'risky' and that therefore anyone with any underlying conditions needs to weigh up all the possible risks to them before they travel because they can't expect to control every aspect of their trip.

I simply said that no one could expect to.

And no-one has, Ontopofthesunset. Amazing.

anyone with any underlying conditions needs to weigh up all the possible risks to them before they travel

And I said this too, in my original post about having migraines. So there's no problem, then, is there?

No, there isn't. I'm not sure why you seem to take it so personally. Some of the responses on this thread have suggested that people with small children shouldn't fly because of the possibility of disturbing other people and my observations were just about the inherently risky nature of travel for all people. I mentioned the migraine because that was a specific problem you quoted.

DD has Aspergers and ADHD, so is pretty active all the time. She also suffers occasionally from travel sickness (partly as a result of stomach reflux). She's now 11, but has flown relatively frequently since 9 months old, including a number of transatlantic trips.

What we have always done is prepared her in advance for flying, talking about the journey, airports, security, airplanes etc.

Organised ourselves with things to entertain her and keep her fed (and watered) if need be.
Had spare clothes for her and us (partly in case luggage goes missing, partly in case we have travel sickness issues).

And actively parented her on the journeys - read stories, play card, colouring in together, getting her interested in a movie before finding one for ourselves....that sort of thing. And going for a walk while out for the bathroom, looking out the window in the galley together etc to pass a while before sitting back down - without disturbing others. (We always make sure in advance that we have seats together so we are only disturbing each other to get out, and if I have to travel solo with her, we take an aisle and middle for the same reason).

The number of times I have lost out on parts of my dinner as kids meals can be so rubbish but the adult ones can be bad too (kids ones usually have something edible on them, and then there's the bread roll at least on the adult one).

If she has started kicking (happened once) - we tell her to stop and distracted her with something else.

There was another flight which had been horribly delayed by weather, so we sat on a runway for 3 hours late at night, before being able to take off - she had eaten a slice of pizza in the airport but wasn't allowed to recline and was getting fractious as getting cold, tired and wanted to sleep (and reasonably hungry too as the pizza was only a snack until dinner on board) - and because we were on an "active runway" (parked way off to the side of the airport but not at the gate anymore) I couldn't get food from my bag for her or her cosy hoodie to snuggle into and sleep. All I could do was tell her stories and snuggle up to her (I was in the middle), DH got permission eventually to quickly get her hoodie and some crackers from the bag and she was able to nibble, get cosy and was asleep before we actually took off. But there were lots and lots of babies and kids on that flight, and in fact the worst behaved were an adult extended family on their way home who had hit the bar hard before boarding, and were all drunk, tired and hungry, with a few voluble about the delay and wanting dinner etc, while 2 kept screaming at the lightening outside (lots! quite a storm going on). Mostly the parents were dealing with the babies and children, as best they could, and cabin crew were trying to help where they could. We had a further delay as we went back to the gate for the adult group to be taken off by security - but no body gave out about that!

Lottieandmia - I think the difference between what you and I are saying, and what the OP experienced, is the parenting.

We stopped the attempt at kicking, and concentrated on our DCs - whereas the parents in OP case slept and DGM was ineffectual at best in controlling the DC.

It's not that we shouldn't attempt to travel with our DCs, it's that we should respect the fact that we are in public and keep reasonable control over them, as we would anywhere else. (And what many of the parents who are posting on this thread seem to do - just not the parents in the OPs case and some other poster's cases dealing with other people's children).

I'm not sure why you seem to take it so personally.

Because several of the responses were in response to my post, and were saying that people like me were "too fragile" to fly at all. That is pretty personal, hence I took it personally. Hope that helps, Ontopofthesunset.

Thank you. That is very helpful.

I would have had a word with cabin crew about it. You can't really control noise, but the other behaviour was inappropriate. I think realistically at least Mum or Dad should have stayed awake whilst other other slept. It was really fair on the Grandmother, never mind other passengers.

I thought parents made provisions to keep children entertained?

I would personally be mortified if my child was inconveniencing others.

annie i din't think it was daniel that made that comment